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Soldier: The Valorous (Army Men-themed New WoD/CofD fan game)

07-12-2018, 07:02 PM

Who here remembers the Army Men? Those little green plastic soldier dudes that have been around since the 1950's and are still going strong today. They are one of the quintessential toys of an American boy's childhood and you could fit them into any imagination-based scenario you wanted, anything you could think of.

Hell, even if you weren't that imaginative, you could still go out in the backyard and blow them up with firecrackers....

Alright, this is a fan-game for First Edition New World of Darkness (mainly because I am more familiar with 1e) that is sort of a tongue-in-cheek game that could also be theoretically functional within the setting (similar to the fan-game Senshi: The Merchandising from the Classic World of Darkness) where the PC's are essentially living Army Men and similar toy soldiers, tapping into the collective subconscious of Humankind's own hopes and dreams of valor, glory, and heroism to fight against the forces of darkness and evil in the hopes of restoring some semblance of truth and justice to the World of Darkness.

It is heavily inspired by the themes discussed in Changeling: The Dreaming, Hunter: The Reckoning, Senshi: The Merchandising, Hunter: The Vigil, and Princess: The Hopeful.

The main theme of Soldier is Sacrifice, and the main mood of the game is one of dark adventure and unlikely heroism.

Soldiers (also known as the Valorous) are often randomly selected from the ranks of the ordinary people who have dreams of being something greater than themselves, whether it be the kid playing superhero in the backyard or the twenty-something mall ninja who fantasizes about being a commando, they all get the Call from a mysterious entity known only as the High Command to go out and fight the myriad evils that plague this world that they live in. The truth of the supernatural is revealed to them and they choose to make a stand (I'll admit, I stole this one from Hunter: The Reckoning) and they undergo a spiritual and metaphysical process known as The Imagining, which gives them their new abilities and directives.

Soldiers need not be based on just the common World War II and Cold War-era G.I.'s most commonly represented among Army Men toys, although these are the most common Soldiers.

Soldiers can also take on the archetypes of any classic warrior or hero whether it be Cowboys & Native Americans, Civil War troops, Roman legionaries, Samurai, Ninja, Medieval Knights, Vikings, Celtic tribesmen, Aztec warriors, 18th Century Pirates, Revolutionary War-era Minutemen, or even Sci-Fi/Fantasy archetypes such as Spacemen, Colonial Marines, or D&D-style Adventurers. Soldiers come in many different styles and archetypes as they give their all to make the World of Darkness a little less dark.

Alright, I don't have much else as I just came up with this idea on the fly but I do want to dedicate myself to the development of this idea and see if we can make a full fan game out of it. This is very much a work in progress and fan input is welcome.

Some ideas I had for general character creation is as follows.

The main five splats are called Detachments (similar to Clans or Auspices)
The main morality stat is called Duty and is based on devoting yourself to a cause and making sacrifices for the greater good
Powers are called Techniques and are fueled by an energy called Chakra
Instead of Blood Potency or Wyrd to measure the capacity of your powers, you have Rank, each level corresponding to a common military rank.

As for factions, I am unsure if I want to do another five splats to accompany the Detachments or if I should do like Hunter: The Vigil and have a tier system of factions (Squads, Platoons, Battalions) similar to the Cell/Compact/Conspiracy system of Vigil.

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I mean, turning into a figure is not necessarily silly. It could be pretty horrific actually, even with a bit of tongue-in-cheekness. Turning to plastic, having a limited range of motion, possibly a change in scale.

Personally I prefer the transformed version since it is a very different thing from other CoD gamelines. The idea being that since these are embodiments of the gestalt concept of a soldier that the stronger imagination of children has caused the effects to be more toy focused than real soldiers.

Comment

I mean, turning into a figure is not necessarily silly. It could be pretty horrific actually, even with a bit of tongue-in-cheekness. Turning to plastic, having a limited range of motion, possibly a change in scale.

Personally I prefer the transformed version since it is a very different thing from other CoD gamelines. The idea being that since these are embodiments of the gestalt concept of a soldier that the stronger imagination of children has caused the effects to be more toy focused than real soldiers.

Failing in your duty could turn you more toy like.

I like that idea a lot, actually. And I will be borrowing it, if that's okay with you.

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Or maybe they're just the spirits of warriors reborn and given powers, not sure yet.

Still torn between if I want to go full-on silly or make it a serious game of sorts.

The main roadblock to being serious if going for astic toys would be the total inabilitt to talk to normal humans as equals. Youre going to need to solve that.

Mechs: Because even the Chronicles of Darkness needs robot fights.DarkFrame: Crossover setting that puts Chronicles of Darkness in the far future that is Warframe.Monarch: The Endless You are an alien ruler, charged with maintaining a people who you shape to suit your needs.